Things To Do – Writing by pretending to be a 14th century monk.

The wind tosses the waves about across the road. If I stand to one side of the window, I can see the Floating Wreck Lighthouse which The Thunderous Mother runs as a museum in the summer months. A force of electricity flashes behind the lighthouse in the shape of a fork, this eerily lights the white building up. The huge waves slap angrily against the sea wall and the rain lashes down non-stop onto the pavements.

I give my specs another quick clean on the bottom of my jumper and put them back on. Standing under the yellow street light is a monk with his hood up; he goes down onto his knees and starts to pray. The rain falls heavier as if whipping the ground but the monk does not seem to notice it.

I open the window and stick my head out as far as it will go. The window creaks open and the monk stops praying. As he looks up at me, the rain hits his face. His lips are cracked and thin under the street light. He stares at me so strongly that my stomach churns; I can only imagine the rest of his face and I back away.

(page 14 Will Blyton and The Stinking Shadow)

When two worlds meet! Oh dear, it doesn’t quite always go to plan.

Hamnet has mistakenly conjured up a 14th century monk and brought him to 1970s Groaningsea. Problems or conflict, as it is often called, is what pushes the plot along. A great way to cause conflict is to put a character into a situation she or he is not comfortable with. In this case, we have got a character thrown into an utterly strange world. In the book “Will Blyton and The Stinking Shadow”, we can read how Will copes with discovering the monk is standing outside his home but we do not find out how the monk feels at that point in time.

As an exercise to get that writing muscle flexing – why don’t you imagine that you are the boy monk, Thadeus and suddenly you are in this strange world?

What do you see?

What do you hear?

What can you smell?

What does this world feel like to touch?

How does all this make Thadeus feel? Is he afraid or excited?

Remember, Thadeus will not recognise many of the things he encounters so he has to make sense of it by comparing it to what he knows. Try to imagine how it feels to be Thadeus and then write a few paragraphs – you never know, once you get started, you might not be able to stop. You could end up having a full story.